Ex-rebel Says Cia Created Contras

July 18, 1985|The Boston Globe

WASHINGTON — A former leader of the U.S.-backed rebels trying to overthrow the Nicaraguan government says in a magazine article to be published today that the group was created, funded and directed by the Central Intelligence Agency.

From 1982-84, the article`s author, Edgar Chamorro, was in charge of public relations for the Honduras-based rebel group, known as the Nicaraguan Democratic Force (known by its Spanish acronym, FDN) and often called ``contras,`` short for counterrevolutionaries.

In the article published today in The New Republic, a magazine that has editorially opposed the Sandinistas and occasionally supported the rebels, Chamorro spells out his charges in detail. Among his claims:

(BU) When the rebel leaders held their first U.S. news conference in December 1982, they had all met each other only the day before, at an executive suite in a Miami hotel, where two CIA agents coached them on possible questions and told them to lie if asked whether they had any contact with U.S. government officials.

(BU) Before then, anti-Sandinista civilians had no formal connection to military rebel leaders. ``The CIA had brought the groups together with money and unequivocal promises of support.``

(BU) Chamorro says he ``sat in on meetings where the CIA men advised (rebel directors) how to win votes for continued CIA funding. The CIA men didn`t have much respect for Congress. They said we could change how representatives voted as long as we knew how to `sell` our case and place them in a position of looking soft on communism. They suggested members whom we should lobby and gave us the names of big shots we should contract in their home districts.``

(BU) A CIA agent set up the group`s headquarters, handpicked the directorate and paid salaries, which in Chamorro`s case was $2,000 a month plus expenses. ``CIA men sat by, with their yellow legal pads, writing down whatever we said we needed.``